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Monday, January 30th
On the Art of Publishing
Ed Baron is a publisher of art prints and books, thanks to me. Today Sable Publishing receives over 300 queries each week, even more and is listed in the Literary Market Place and the Writer's Market, on both online web sites and their published annual books. Sable Publishng books are available from every online bookseller world wide and orderable in every bookstore.
We started Sable Publishing after a terrible experience with the publication of my first book. The Publisher had complete control over the format and the cover art and used my art work but ignored my design suggestions. The initial print run for the trade paperback a $15.00 retailer, was of 15,000 to satisfy book store orders, and supply distributors. The Publisher promised a promotional campaign of $50,000 and author visits to book expos and ads, all at their expense. The publisher then went bust. The book remains available to this day, but only as remainders or used book leftovers of the first print edition and of course I received hundreds of books in lieu of royalties..
Hyacinthe Baron on 01.30.06 @ 08:35 AM EST [more..]
Friday, January 27th
ARTISTS’ STATEMENTS AND MANIFESTOS
 Having written various statements over the years in support of my painting I am always at a loss for what to say that in any way sheds light on the work -- my work. I rarely read other painters statements. If I do begin to read a few lines I rarely continue after the first paragraph because if the work doesn’t explain itself as part of its content then why give it any credit? As far as I’m concerned the artist has failed in their intentions. Oh I know, I know that gallery directors, curators, critics and the public want verbiage. But I often find artists’ statements to be either obvious, condescending, arrogant or just plain ignorant and rarely do they illuminate the artist or the art. From time to time I try to ’not write’ a statement in the usual manner. Instead I try to write something that would stand alone as a piece just as each painting stands on its own. Here are a few of those ’non-statements’.
Walter King on 01.27.06 @ 09:58 AM EST [more..]
Wednesday, January 25th
Promote Your Art by Writing a Novel
Funny how the mind wanders during long distance training runs for marathons. On one such hot and humid summer run in Hawaii, I got the idea to write a novel. I am a visual artist.
But as you know, the artist’s life is full of hopes and dreams, challenges and strife. So I thought that day, dragging my butt some fifteen miles while floating from a bit of heat stroke, wouldn’t an artist serve as an interesting main character in a novel of fiction? And who’s artistic life – with all the highs and lows, did I not know better than my own! So, over the course of 1,000 miles, the story’s setting and conflicts were plotted to a climax of the realization of life’s final success – or dismal failure. In fiction, the writer controls results, not like in reality were talent isn’t everything. It can be shunned by the powers of art market manipulators protecting their own best interests. Not every deserving artist can be a star. It comes down to supply and demand in our capitalistic society.
Pygoya on 01.25.06 @ 07:22 AM EST [more..]
Monday, January 23rd
MAKING PROFOUND ART
‘As I turned the corner walking towards my office, I saw them, a river of humanity, all rushing towards their own individual little cubicles, to fill their roles of utility in the heart of the huge corporate machines that had chosen to absorb them. I remembered the grey faces on the commuter train, of veterans that had done this for decades. And the words of my Mentor, the One that had finally opened my eyes.
“Working for someone is a modern form of slavery. If you dream, you cannot be an employee. It is only when you stop dreaming that you can fall into this hypnotic condition. You believe you are making decisions, but only those that have already been made for you. The ‘dream’ is the most real thing there is.”
These were the words of the Dreamer, who told me that the future doesn’t exist, because it hasn’t happened yet, and the past is gone. The world as we know it doesn’t exist, either, because it is only our own projection of chemical electrical impulses onto the screen of our brains. It is not the events as they happened, only a time delayed and heavily filtered rendition of them.
Andrew Wielawski on 01.23.06 @ 09:04 AM EST [more..]
Friday, January 20th
ART BASEL MIAMI BEACH: YEAR THREE:
 Pfew…Welcome to Miami.
Where does one start? ART BASEL MIAMI BEACH means different things to different people. Depending on what your goals and objectives are, it could be very different person to person. If you are a bartender, that means dealing with a bunch of high class and loud people demanding extra vodka in their free drinks. If you are an artist, you are hoping you will sell work. (And get paid by your art dealer). If you are a dealer, you are hoping to meet new collectors, make exchanges with other deals and basically SELL your wares to recoup the tens of thousands of dollars you have just laid out for the privilege of rubbing elbows with every international art person who has the same idea as you. – NOT TO MISS A THING.
 If you are a hotel owner, you are looking to pack in the place with premium rates, and show minimalism art in your lobby space. Minimalism is back in by the way. ) If you are a DJ you are looking to get steady gigs during the entire week and hope to get paid by the promoter who hired you. You can put on your resume that you just performed during the HUGO BOSS party at the SETAI and hope that the guy driving the Rolls Royce parked right in front of the hotel will notice you and hire you for his kid’s “Bat Mitzvah.” (Second marriage so there is a young kid in the house.)
Laurence Gartel on 01.20.06 @ 08:23 AM EST [more..]
Wednesday, January 18th
ART AS A REFLECTION OF HUMAN NATURE
 An argument is raging: Sometimes we set out to do one thing and discover something unexpected. Our call for artists has exposed many questions. Do we make art as a reflection of our human nature in an attempt to rise above the basest desires, or as a rebellion against the crudest aspect of our human nature?
There are those who claim there is actually no such thing as a definable human nature and so argue the question: How is art possible?
There are those who claim in University and College art departments and think tanks that art is a cover up by personalities who refuse to accept an imposed version of moral codes and values and of what human nature is: Look at a copy of any fashion magazine to see how abstract and conceptual 'art' has become. Fashion photographers are the first to exploit the new, the far out, the technological diversity. Visit any one of a number of Chelsea Galleries in NYC or Bergamont Station in Santa Monica or check out the Art Dealers Alliance, a kind of union of dealers who want art to be a way to compete in a 'healty manner' at it's art fair shown next to Art Basel Miami: Reminds me of the kind of controversy that began with the Pop Artists first alternate show at the Janis Gallery.
Hyacinthe Baron on 01.18.06 @ 10:05 AM EST [more..]
Friday, January 13th
LACK OF VISION?
Truly – utterly – new Art does not exist, and any artist who would claim that his art owes nothing to others before him is, in my opinion, a true and utter fool because Art does not live in a vacuum and only gains significance in that it expands the light of the previously known and the boundaries of what was understood and possible until then.
Whatever goes into shaping and making visible the new will have part of its roots somewhere in the old – hidden or unknown to the masses perhaps, but somewhere. The trick – mastery? – of the artist lies in his capability to envision the unfathomable, and in the way he mixes up the pieces of the puzzle to compose a new one we hadn’t been able to see until then; in the way he appropriates and absorbs his influences [past, present and envisioned] and works damn hard to incorporate them all in his work thus gaining the right to be seen as one of their transmitters.
Jose Freitas Cruz on 01.13.06 @ 10:17 AM EST [more..]
Wednesday, January 11th
ART AND REALITY
 I would like to start with greetings and best wishes to all those who take part in our discussions. I gain a great deal of pleasure from reading your opinions and comments, and in trying to answer them, in my own way, by incorporating your ideas into new and later discussions.
Today I will touch on a subject that has always been very dear to me: the relationship between art and reality.
In the early 1900s, great interest in the themes of work and social justice had already been expressed by many artists. This could be interpreted as the natural conclusion of the process of emancipation that had occurred at the end of the preceding century. In Italy, this interest in social themes was expressed and obtained important results in the works of the early Futurists. More precisely, we can recall that the "Expanding City" (by Boccioni) was originally entitled "Work". In the same year, 1911, Carrà painted his famous work "The funeral of Galli the anarchist". This is evidence of the relationship between the Futurists and the Anarchists, and between the Futurists and the Trade Union movement.
Alberto Sughi on 01.11.06 @ 08:35 AM EST [more..]
Monday, January 9th
ARGENTINE RAILWAY ARTIST, CARLOS REGAZZONI
 Twenty some years ago, Argentine Carlos Regazzoni worked peddling kerosene from a street cart. Living at that time in proximity to rail yards, he awoke late one night to loud metallic clanging: a crew of rail workers with heavy machinery changing the track rails. “Someone has to paint this,” he thought. And thus began his 20-plus year laborious love affair with “railway art”.
Regazzoni’s railway paintings, with their loose broad linear strokes and intense colors, number in the thousands. Through the passage of time, the paintings gave way to large welded metal sculptures, produced by the artist with rail yard scraps and abandoned train car parts.
Veronica Caminos on 01.09.06 @ 08:15 AM EST [more..]
Friday, January 6th
I'M IMPRESSED ALREADY!
As I'm writing this, I'm cowering and fearfully looking all about because I know I'm about to displease the Art Gods.
I'm sitting and writing in judgement, knowing the slings and arrows are headed my way. But ... here we go.
I love Impressionism (see, I gave it a capital "I") as much as the next person. I really do. I love Degas and Renoir and Pissarro and Monet and all of the greats who followed. Of course, the Impressionists played a huge role in art history and greatly influenced the way we view art today. I find it incredible that they initially had to fight so hard for acceptance. Don't we all?
Last year, I visited quite a few art museums where Impressionist pieces were among the first things I saw. All I could think was, "Oh great, more Impressionism!"
Michael Corbin on 01.06.06 @ 10:48 AM EST [more..]
Wednesday, January 4th
SPICUZZA’s SYMBOLS
There has been some discussion recently on the forums about visits between artists here on absolutearts. I’ve done this a few times during my various travels and usually write a little something about the artists I’ve visited whether they posted their work on Absolute Arts or not starting with my first blogs written in Argentina. Recently I had a chance to visit the studio of Carol Spicuzza in Indianapolis, IN. Carol doesn’t post on Absolute Arts but sometimes follows the blogs and the forum. She contacted me some time ago and we‘ve been talking back and forth. When I first saw her work on the net I thought it was drawn well and painted well, that the subject matter was interesting for the most part but wasn’t blown away by any means. All this changed when I walked into her house and saw the work hanging on the wall.
Walter King on 01.04.06 @ 01:43 PM EST [more..]
Monday, January 2nd
2006 - a happy new year...
 Good morning - it's 1 January 2006.
Yesterday I performed all traditional Danish rituals in order to enter 2006 in a happy way.
In order to make 2006 a Happy New Year.
A splendid seafood dinner, serpentines, table bombs, funny hats, lots of rockets etc.
Except one traditional Danish ritual.
I was not drunk.
No beer. No vine. No drinks. No champagne. Lots of mineral water.
My entrance to 2006 was vertical. Not horizontal as it often was.
I have no hangovers.
I have cleaned up my domestic domaine and I am ready to write.
 I have decided that 2006 is a happy new year...
A wise man - a philosopher from Copenhagen - said at the end of 2005:
Don't put your life into an account. Live your life now - passionately.
Don't commit yourself to any New Year Resolutions.
Don't exercise.
Don't loose weight.
Don't quit smoking.
Don't...
Don't put your life into an account. Live your life now - passionately.
The wise man of course said this with a smile.
But I sure see his point.
Asbjorn Lonvig on 01.02.06 @ 04:00 AM EST [more..]
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